The Green Impact for Health project has been developed for General Practice by the National Union of Students, GPs, trainees, and medical students. It’s supported by University of Bristol, NHS Health Education South West and the Severn Faculty of the RCGP. The web-based scheme is designed to improve the environmental performance of general practice while saving money and ensuring that the way we provide our services offers the greatest benefit to society as a whole.
Marden Medical Practice is now taking part in this scheme.
The project was based on the highly successful Green Impact scheme run by NUS in over 400 organisations including universities, hospitals and dental surgeries. It works by guiding staff through a set of pro-sustainability actions, each of which earn points towards an overall award; bronze, silver or gold. Each action has a rationale or evidence base, and most have advice on the easiest ways to achieve them. The practice uploads the evidence to show that they are meeting the criteria for the scheme and there is a light tough external validation of the evidence.
A few examples are:
- Encouraging the use of social prescribing (See in Services for information on Social Prescribing)
- Referring patients at risk of fuel poverty for support and advice
- Reducing office waste e.g. though consistent double-sided printing
- Facilitating the use of the GSK Inhaler Recycling Scheme
- Having a policy in place to facilitate GPs wishing to cycle to home visits
